John Aylward’s Sona raises $800m for latest credit fund
Sona Asset Management has raised $800m (£629m) for its second ‘Capital Solutions’ strategy, exceeding its original target of $500m.
Capital Solutions is Sona’s private credit strategy. Capital Solutions II, or CapSolII, is the first commingled fund launched by the European credit manager. It follows the launch of its first fund in 2020, which was an SMA and raised $300m.
The fund has raised capital from existing and new investors, including sovereign wealth funds, insurance companies, endowments, pension funds and asset managers.
The fund will provide financing to “companies in situations where funding is scarce”, according to a statement.
So far, the fund has focused on performing companies across both public and private markets. To deploy the fund, Sona has made three senior hires to its capital solutions team. This includes head of capital markets Stephen Smith, who joined the group last year from Barclays, where he was global co-head of leveraged finance syndicate.
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John Aylward, founder and chief investment officer at Sona, said: “Given the ever-changing landscape of credit markets, opportunities emerge where the traditional set-up falls short. Sona is able to deliver tailor-made solutions to companies while operating with agility and flexibility.”
Owain Griffiths, partner and portfolio manager, added: “We believe that the approach we take within our Capital Solutions strategy provides demonstrable and differentiated benefits. The flexibility to invest across what we see as the best opportunities in both public and private markets facilitates healthy deployment. When combined with significant recycling, this can provide a boost to the multiple on invested capital, which we believe is being borne out in the results of both of our CapSol funds to date.”
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Sona is an alternative asset manager which manages around $8bn of assets for institutional investors. It focuses on the European credit markets across three strategies: a long/short credit hedge fund; its priate credit strategy, Capital Solutions; and a CLO platform.
